


That's The Thing

by sarcasticsra



Category: Burn Notice
Genre: Introspection, M/M, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-03-14
Updated: 2012-03-14
Packaged: 2017-11-01 22:41:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 750
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/362073
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sarcasticsra/pseuds/sarcasticsra
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Larry used to know him, is the thing.</p>
            </blockquote>





	That's The Thing

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to Kelly and Abigail for the beta!

Larry used to know him, is the thing. They worked together for a long time—three years is practically eons by spy standards—and they developed a rhythm. Not a pattern; patterns are dangerous and get you killed. But a rhythm, a rhythm is fluid, and it can be flexible, which is exactly what they’d needed. Back-and-forth, give-and-take, twist, dip, spin away—it was like a dance, one with infinite possible steps, but still that same familiar rhythm underneath, guiding them to the right path.

They both knew it at the time. They both recognized it for what it was. So did the government, except they referred to it in terms of “noteworthy” success rates.

Larry still thinks it applies.

And Michael has to admit, what with the way they got the name at the courthouse, he felt himself slip back into that rhythm a little bit, balancing it with the separate one that he, Fi, and Sam share. He would be lying if he said it hadn’t felt comfortable, like slipping on a well-worn pair of shoes.

Of course, shoes generally don’t make you feel like you’re slicing away bits of your soul just by wearing them. That effect is all Larry.

It’s _all_ Larry, is the other thing. He slips into your head before you notice and sets up shop, chipping away at the parts of you that you thought you could never abandon. Michael always thinks Larry can’t get to him anymore, and then when he least expects it, he shows up and blows that comforting fiction straight to hell. He can still manipulate him. He does it every time they see each other.

And it must have been so easy, he thinks, back when they first met. Larry was a very effective operative. He was so green, so young, so obviously pissed off at his father and the world. Christ, they’d paired a kid and his Daddy issues up with a good-looking older guy who knew exactly what buttons to push, what lines to say, when to praise, and when to criticize—a guy who could grin at him like he was the best damn thing in the world, make himself _needed_. Was it any wonder what had happened? Was it any wonder that they’d fit as well as they had?

Was it a shock that it’d taken all of three missions together before Larry had him pinned up against their motel room door, kissing him so hard it hurt? Making him want it, _need_ it, beg for it, those dark, intense eyes, staring at him with a heat that could almost make him come without any contact? Making him crave that contact anyway and want to do anything, _anything_ he could to get it?

Was it even a surprise that Larry had seen him do all the things he’s least proud of, had carefully guided him toward all the things he now wants so desperately to be able to forget?

Because, really, that’s their rhythm, down to its core: slick and deadly, and easy, so easy, _too easy_ to get lost in.

And Larry knows that, is another thing.

He knows he can bring out that rhythm, knows that Michael will fall into it with him. Maybe not as fully, not as completely as before, but the echoes of the past get louder and clearer the longer they’re in it. He knows that, too. He knows that Sam and Fi somehow keep those echoes at bay, keep them faded and distant, in the past where they belong. He tries to work around that. He almost succeeds.

But he never will, not really, not ever again. He can use that rhythm, he can isolate him, he can turn on that grin, but what he doesn’t know is what kills him. That’s his weakness.

He doesn’t know how and he’ll never know why—how they work, why they stay together, how deep it runs, why it makes sense. He doesn’t know what friendship is. He doesn’t know trust. He doesn’t know how to relate to someone without manipulation.

He doesn’t know that Michael does.

Because Michael used to be worse than he is now, so much worse—maybe, probably, _definitely_ as bad as Larry—so his lack of understanding makes sense. But he has a quality that Larry never will, probably never could, and as long as Larry doesn’t know that, he’s safe.

He’ll never know Michael, not really. Not ever again.

That’s the thing about Larry.


End file.
